


Better Together

by shinythings



Category: due South
Genre: F/F, Minor Benton Fraser/Ray Kowalski
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-14
Updated: 2019-12-14
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:24:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21788374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shinythings/pseuds/shinythings
Summary: A drink after work changes things.
Relationships: Elaine Besbriss/Francesca Vecchio
Comments: 6
Kudos: 10
Collections: due South Seekrit Santa 2019





	Better Together

**Author's Note:**

  * For [feroxargentea](https://archiveofourown.org/users/feroxargentea/gifts).

> For the 2019 DS Seekrit Santa. 
> 
> This is my first time writing Elaine and Frannie together. They're a great pair and I wish we got more of them together on screen.
> 
> I hope you like it :)

Elaine sat at the bar. The beer taps were dull, shiny metal covered in layers of spilled booze and grease from fries. Her own glass was cloudy, beads of water dripped down the side and soaked into a deteriorating coaster. Dirt and grime gathered under her nail as she absently scratched into the sticky build-up on the table.

God, she was bored.

Life at the 25th precinct was quiet; time trickled by slowly. She’d gotten her badge, been placed at the 2-5, and spent most her shifts so far manning the drunk wagon- cuffing assholes who thought pissing on storefronts was a good life choice. She’d lost count of the number of cars she’d pulled over with broken taillights. Fraser and Ray weren’t around to ask her to check prints. There were no calls when she got home begging her to run back to the precinct and run interference with Welsh. The 2-5 didn’t have a live-in wolf who snuck donuts out of her plate, or a civilian aide who’d sit on Elaine’s desk and talk about the psychology of the colour yellow.

Speaking of civilian aides, she’d spent months training Frannie. Late nights blurred together with coffee and pizza, talking about databases, filing systems and how to treat the printer right. Francesca Vecchio had always been around, buzzing in and out of her brother’s orbit and the station for years. Elaine had always noticed her; I mean who wouldn’t- what with the hair and the confidence and the crop tops? But Frannie was funny, really funny. And she couldn’t type for shit, but Elaine had watched her hug a crying girl at the station and hold the kid’s hand while she talked to Fraser about an abusive asshole. Frannie would work out nicely at the 2-7.

Elaine just wished she was still there to watch the inevitable fireworks up close. Someone coughed behind her.

“What’s bakin'?”

Elaine turned and came face to face with a bare midriff. “It’s _shakin_’. _Shaking, _Frannie-not baking. You’re late.”

“Bakin', shakin', cakin', _whatever_… And don’t talk to me about being late! Fraser and Ray were hogging the supply closet again and the printer needed paper. How was your day then?”

“Oh, you know…arrested a guy for jaywalking. Filled out a report about a robbery.”

Francesca Vecchio threw herself into the stool next to Elaine and smiled winningly at the bartender. “I’ll have a cocktail. Fruitiest one you got.” She looked over at Elaine, saw the curls escaping a usually tidy bun, the downward creases by the corner of Elaine’s mouth. “Robbery, huh? Anything interesting?”

If anything, Elaine’s mouth turned down further.

“Jewelry store. Pretty sure it’s an inside job. Spencer won’t listen though. He thinks it’s some neighborhood kid.”

“Ah.” Frannie looked down at the bright pink liquid in her glass and the sad lump of pineapple bobbing alone in it. It was going to be a long night.

***

Five drinks in and Elaine was a giggling mess, perched precariously in her seat as she watched Frannie deliver a straight-faced impression of Welsh chewing out Ray and Fraser.

“And then…Mother Superior marched through the precinct and ripped Welsh a new one, because Ray mentioned, very loudly, that the saintly sisters knew all about the drugs. God, Welsh looked ready to blow when he called Ray and Frase in, and they showed up with 10 pounds of fancy bath-salts- with crystal meth mixed in.”

“Drugs in bath salts and…nuns?” Elaine’s eyebrows had climbed all the way up her forehead, but the lines by her lips had smoothed out as she smiled and drained her beer.

“Don’t look so happy about it…I gotta tell Ma that she can’t buy those fancy soaps from the sisters at St Mary’s anymore. I don’t even wanna _think_ about how long she’s going to complain for. She loved those nuns…God and shopping all at the same time!”

Elaine snickered into her beer as she ordered another. “So…made any progress with Fraser?”

Frannie sighed. Fraser was smart, kind, beautiful. He smelled good, looked great in red. But she knew he wasn’t interested. Not in her anyway. She hadn’t missed the looks he’d been sneaking her supposed ‘brother’. But that was a whole ‘nother story.

Frannie’d been looking for some kind of perfect ever since she’d been a kid, wanting something better than what she saw at home. She’d ended up with her bastard of an ex-husband, though that hadn’t lasted long. Fraser seemed like everything she’d ever wanted, all wrapped up in a warm, red, Canadian bow. But Frannie knew she had a blind spot- she’d been fixating- those online psychology classes were eye-opening.

Staring at Fraser was like staring straight at the sun; you were blinded until your eyes readjusted. She was only just starting to notice the world around her again- and the people in it. In the months before Elaine had left, Frannie had noticed, with warmth rising through her, that Elaine was smart and beautiful and looked good in red too.

“He keeps running away like a frightened rabbit. Besides, there’s only so much free dog sitting I can do. Ma barely tolerates Ante in the house. You wouldn’t believe the amount of fur on the couches when there’s two of them. I could make a coat.”

Elaine was sceptical. Frannie had chased after Fraser like Dief tailed a good jelly-filled donut. Hell, she’d spent more than an hour or two wistfully thinking about the guy herself. Fraser was excitement- he and Vecchio, _Kowalski_ she silently reminded herself, had always managed to snag the good cases. The ones that had half the station scratching their heads. Elaine wanted that.

***

“Anyway, your robbery. Why’d you think it was an inside job?”

Elaine frowned at the abrupt change- slowly followed Frannie back to five-drinks-ago. “The rob…oh you mean the jewelry store. I dunno…it’s just too clean. There’s security footage missing. And only the really expensive stuff went missing. Everything else was just…left there. Stuff that would take us months to save for…all just lying there, untouched.”

“So why does Captain Assface think it’s some kid?”

“The kid had been loitering outside for a few weeks, and he’s got a record. Broke into a pawn shop. But Frannie, he’s small fry- he wouldn’t even know what to do with the half the stuff that’s been stolen. He’s lifted watches, not diamonds. And how’d he know how to rob the place without setting off the alarm? The kid’s not Einstein. He got caught about five minutes after he broke into the pawn shop the last time.”

“So who do _you_ think really did it, then?”

Elaine slumped back into her seat and stared at the ceiling, curls escaping and hanging down the back of her chair. “God, I don’t know. I think it’s someone who knows the place, and the usual routine.”

Frannie downed the rest of her drink and signaled for another. “So maybe it’s like in my book ‘The Price of Love’. This woman, she sells her necklace right, because her son’s sick and she needs to pay for his medication. Except then the son goes and steals the necklace back, because it’s the only thing his mum has left from her dead husband. He gets caught- but this beautiful princess pardons him when she hears the story. They fall in love, but there’s this stalker who’s obsessed with the princess. He frames the kid for another robbery, and he kills someone. So the princess can’t step in and save her man the second time he gets in trouble.”

“Yeah Frannie, I don’t think this kid’s in love with a princess.”

“Well duh…but he’s definitely being framed by someone! He’s a…whad’ya call it…a blue sardine. Someone wants everyone to focus on him because he’s an obvious suspect.”

“_Red herring_, Frannie. And actually…that fits. Spencer hasn’t even bothered to look into any of the staff at the store because the kid’s so damn convenient. But how would any of the employees know about the kid’s history? And why was the kid hanging around the store anyway?” Elaine looked animated, more alive than she had been when she’d finished her shift and come to the bar. She was sitting forward in her seat, back straight and eyes shining.

“No idea…gotta leave something for you to solve!”

“Yeah…yeah thanks, Frannie. You’re gonna make a great cop one day, you know. Any precinct would be lucky to have you.” Francesca Vecchio, Elaine thought, looked particularly fetching with a blush staining her cheeks and her hair falling over her eyes.

“Well you’re a great cop _now_. Maybe when I get myself through the academy, we’ll end up being partners. Like Fraser and Ray.”

“Like Fraser and Ray, huh? Solving all the best cases and making eyes at each other while Ante follows us around?”

Frannie smirked as warmth rose through her and pooled in her chest, “We could always lock ourselves in a closet for a few hours too.” She watched Elaine grin into her beer. “So Besbriss, I think you should come home with me now, say hi to my ma, help me walk my dog. And then tomorrow, maybe you should pop round the station, pick me up and take me to dinner.”

Elaine blinked at her slowly before breaking into a grin. There was that confidence she loved. It had been a long night, but it was shaping up to be a good one.“Maybe we should drive by the jewelry store too…see if we can do some snooping. Dinner and a case?”

“Yeah, it’s a date.”


End file.
